Keynote Address: Caries Management by Resin Infiltration

In the past years several caries sealing approaches have been proposed. They all aim to postpone or even avoid the first invasive intervention, which often initiates a ‘death spiral of restorations’. In contrast to conventional caries sealing, where a resin coat is applied on the lesion surface, caries infiltration aims to occlude the pores within the lesion body with low viscosity light curing resins. That way, diffusion pathways are blocked and lesion progression is slowed down or even arrested. Another indication of caries infiltration is the camouflaging of esthetically disturbing white spot caries lesions and developmental defects, which lose their whitish appearance when they are infiltrated with resin. The presentation will address the current scientific evidence on caries infiltration techniques and give a perspective on future developments.